Marije Cornelissen, on behalf of the Verts/ALE Group. – Mr President, I keep thinking how wonderful it would be if we could hold a debate about the country without the name being such an issue. If we could just concentrate on the progress and on the hard work that still lies ahead, there is enough to do as regards more fundamental rights: stopping corruption and reforming the economy and the labour market. Bizarrely, reaching a solution should not be too hard. Greece has made an offer for a composite name with a geographical denomination, and Macedonia has always stated that what it finds most important is that its identity, culture, nationality and language are not questioned. We would like to give the process a small but significant push by applauding the offer, so we have put in an amendment.

I hope that other groups will vote in favour of this and – who knows? – maybe next year we will be back here and freely speak about ‘North Macedonia’ in which Macedonian people with Macedonian identities and Macedonian culture happily speak Macedonian.